 The Annual Reelin’ for Research Fishing Tournament benefiting the N.C. Children’s Promise is held the first weekend in May in memory of Tony Montana, who passed away from cancer in 2005. In 2008, some friends of Tony’s son, Richard, approached Richard about doing a fishing tournament in memory of his father. After taking a step back, the group of friends asked themselves “What would Tony want?” This led to a unanimous decision to start this tournament for the children!!! Tony believed that he had the opportunity to live such a long and wonderful life, but that many children with cancer are being deprived of that chance. Research to help these children is critical and that is exactly what we are supporting.
The 1st Annual Reelin’ for Research Fishing Tournament was held on May 2, 2009. We proudly presented a check to NC Children’s Promise, the fundraising arm of NC Children’s Hospital for just shy of $30,000. With 16 boats competing and an attendance of more than 200 we were beyond thrilled! For our first year it was a tremendous success!
The 2nd Annual Reelin’ for Research Tournament was held on May 1, 2010. In year two we had a goal to raise $50,000 for NC Children’s Promise and worked really hard to make this year bigger and better! We had learned so much from year one and we were determined to prove we were not just another group of friends talking about making a difference. You can imagine the shock we felt when we realized once again we had exceeded our goal by almost $20,000! We were able to present NC Children’s Promise with a check for almost $70,000!
The 3rd annual Reelin’ for Research tournament was held on May 7th, 2011, and we set an unbelievable goal to raise $100,000. We were a little concerned about meeting this goal but now with two years experience we thought we would just work extra hard and see if we could make it happen. We presented a check to Dr. Gold at the awards ceremony for $98,500 only $1,500 short of our goal. We were honestly shocked and thrilled we almost reached the goal but the wonderful crowd of supporters did not want us to fall just shy of our goal! They rushed the stage handing over cash and checks so we can now say we raised $100,000 at the 2011 tournament! It was the most amazing experience ever! There are no words for the love and support we continue to feel and we can not thank everyone enough!
With the support of so many, we are very proud to say, not only have we met our goals, but exceeded our wildest expectations. We are beyond grateful for all the support and hope to continue our success in 2012. Thank you to all of our Corporate Sponsors, volunteers, and everyone who made a donation in order to help us “land” a cure for the kids!
The Montana Family - Tony, Margaret, Anne Margaret and Richard
|
|
Reelin’ for Research Steering Committee
• Richard Montana
• Sarah Hauser Montana
• Abbey Cooke
• Courtney Boger
• Mike Kilpatrick
• Anne Margaret Correll
• Seth Marshall
• Chris Craven
• Allen Oakley
• Brian Cooke
|
|
 |
